Eternal Recollections
by Dattatreya
Summary: Blaise Zabini: a Slytherin, pureblood to his very core, and without allegiances. The will of a founder crashes into the present through this grey wizard and clashes against the views of Voldemort and Dumbledore.


Title:

Author's Name: Dattatreya Thalasseri

Genre: Mystery/Angst

AN: Might be a little scary, I don't know. I kinda freaked myself out when I was writing it. No main couples and all are traditionally oriented…

Disclaimer: All characters belong to J.K.Rowling. If I owned it, I wouldn't be writing fanfics. This is a work of fiction, any resemblance to real life people, places, and situations are purely coincidental.

Inspirational Quote: _In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies._ Winston Churchill.

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Chapter I: The Dawning Dark.

I dodged a well-aimed spell, distantly cataloguing and simultaneously dismissing the charring of flesh and cloth. I had failed to move fast enough, though it is hard to move quickly when one has been rapid firing spells and pushing one's body to the absolute limit for the past hour. I can feel the straining of every muscle, hear the pounding of in my ears, and taste the in my mouth – a warm metallic taste. But the worst feeling was the ness – a heavy feeling as if lead replaced bone and marrow – that persistently informed me that I was running low on magic.

Not that Malfoy looked that much better then I felt. A cut in his scalp – earned when a wayward spell shattered stone near his head – trickled down the left side of his face. The habitually immaculate appearance of the (self-proclaimed) 'Prince of Slytherin' was obliterated; pressed robes were in disarray and ripped in countless places, slicked hair loose and flying in his face and eyes. His platinum blonde hair reflected the flickering candle light, so did his grey eyes for that matter – cold, hard chips of slate.

He abruptly stood up from his fighter's crouch and stretched his arms above his head. I could hear bones popping and ing in his back. He spoke, his voice knocking me out of my reverie. "Hey, Zabini. Let's call it a day, okay?" I blinked a few times, surprised, and then wearily raised myself from where I was kneeling. The cramped muscles told me that I had probably been in that position for a while, how troublesome.

"What time is it?" I asked. I felt a large yawn coming on and attempted to repress it. When that failed I paced a hand over my mouth to cover it. Breathing in I discovered that the air was thick with smoke, dust, and fog. The fog, of course, was what happened in dank, dark forests at night. After all, the Gryffindors are not the only students to…err.._ bend_ a few rules concerning the Forest. It just happened that this was the best place to practice dueling away from prying eyes, anyone who saw the lights would likely pass it off as another foresty phenomenon.

We were not worried about any of the supposed dangers of the forest either. Salazar Slytherin always provides. First there was the Chamber of Secrets, now we have a citadel in the middle of the forest, and a lovely little hidden passage that leads there right from the common room.

The Citadel – for lack of a better name – was of the open air variety, though not originally. Sometime after Salazar died, the dome caved in, leaving mounds of rubble in the center, mostly in the pool. The pool itself was definitely not the normal sort of pool. Despite its age the water had neither dried up nor become scummy. In fact, when it rained, the pool remained as smooth as a mirror.

But perhaps the strangest part was the color. Neither Draco nor I have even dared to touch the water, so we do not know if the water is black because of a tile lining or if the water itself is black. I really hope it is the former. But I would not put anything past ol' Salazar; therefore, we stay a good distance from the boulder strewn water. We also avoided the pile of rocks on the far right side, where an Occamy nested. How it was here when they are not native is beyond us.

Once Theo came just too close for the Occamy's comfort, the five foot reptilian bird lashed out and nearly bit his arm off. We had a hard time explaining that one to Madame Pomfrey (who was always suspicious of us Slytherins).

The rest of the citadel looked fairly normal, if sadly misplaced. The architecture reminded me of the Romans, but maybe that is just me being Italian. Rooting for the home-team and all. Draco said it looked Byzantine to him, to which I asked if he even knew who the Byzantines were. "Didn't they live in a desert? You know? The big one to the south." I decided to ignore his knowledge of Geography and Muggle History, or lack thereof. I was surprised enough when he said 'Byzantine'.

All in all, the entire place turned out to be excellent for training duels and trying new spells– large space, secluded, and relatively quick to access from our dungeon rooms. Yep, life can hand you things other then lemons.

We have been practicing here as often as the resulting wounds allowed us too, sometimes with Theo, Pansy, or Millie. Some days I found myself here by myself, lazily casting curses at falling leaves. We all come here for different reasons: Draco and Theo to follow in their father's paths, Pansy trains to go where ever Draco goes, Millie comes out of loneliness, and I? I come to learn. Which ever side I end up on, I want them to appreciate me.

"Zabini? Hullo? Anyone there?" I was started out of my thoughts by Draco. Again. The narcissic boy can be really annoying. I raised a hand to swat his face away, a slow movement that he had no trouble avoiding. He backed up a few steps before talking again, "Hey I promised Pansy that I'd help her with her astronomy charts. So I'll be leaving."

I started to nod without registering what he said before suddenly remembering. I called out to his retreating back, "You don't take Astronomy!"

Malfoy turned around while still running and called back, "Any excuse to get_ her_ and _me… alone_!" He crooned the last word. Then, flashing me a quick smile, so un-malfoy-like in its sincerity, he ran deeper into the forest toward the tunnel. Humph, he sure is a creepy one, known him six years and he still manages to surprise me with his massive mood swings. Ohh… wait….what time is it? "Aughh, Malfoy! Wait!" Apparently he had already passed out of hearing, because there was no answering call.

Dang that boy. I irritably kicked away a rouge stone from the limestone floor and hurt my foot in the process. Dang it all. I sighed out loud and turned my attention to the sky, well it must be late since there is no sun to be seen. So it is probably… what is that? Whoa thought I saw something on the wall. A green script, like writing, carved into the walls. Let me see… right here…

I walked around the compound, my fingertips brushing against cold stone, an intense scrutiny revealed no word, green, carved, or otherwise. I relaxed, allowing the age of the place settle heavily around me. I breathed in the misty air, feeling the tang of bitter cold air settle in my lungs. The smoke and dust had long since dissipated, leaving behind a rich earthy smell left by the forest and the intense concentration of magic in the area.

When I began to hear whispers in the back of my mind, I jerked my hand away from the rocks. I stood there for a few moments looking as if frozen in time. The voices stopped the second my hand broke contact, but that did not stop me from hearing my own. Voice, that is.

My thoughts were racing in my head, one right after another, yet none of them made any sense. They were disjointed. I felt like two separate people, one on the inside, confused, scared and startled out of my wits. The other 'me' was on the outside looking in, seeing a young man, fairly tall, short blackish-grey hair that lightly curled at the ends, blue eyes wide and the pupils shrunk, staring at his hand. Then 'I' realized the person 'I' was looking at was me. Slowly – jerkily – I turned around. The boy 'I' saw did the same, slowly turning to see 'me'. I saw no one, except myself staring back at 'me'. I opened my mouth to scream into the nothingness and 'I' saw the boy do the same. No sound came out, my voice was locked within. I turned, 'seeing' a desperate look on my face, and sprinted to the entrance of the tunnel home, heedless of the danger of running headlong through the Forest. 'I' ran after myself, as strange as that sounds, chasing myself down.

I managed to catch up with myself just as the real me, the bodily me, was entering the passage that would take me, that is the real me, back to the castle. 'I', the non-corporeal me, made a desperate dive and landed in my body.

I felt the collision in both my body and my mind. My mind felt as is an explosion occurred with all the force of two universes colliding; my body merely staggered back a few steps.

Somehow, when my mind swam to the surface of the brilliant white energy, I found myself running, all out. Muscles that had had merely ached earlier where screaming their agony, the pain adding a red sheen to the light display in my consciousness. I had a vague sense of stone walls mixed intermittently with wood, of dirt floors, and pain. The pain was what dragged my mind back beneath the lights, till I felt I would go blind, and drown in the intensity of the colors and radiance. I was frantically swimming in the cacophony of colors, red, blue, green, silver and gold, all the colors that, as a whole made up the white.

I felt my mind break the surface of the mire of colors. I dimly saw the end of the tunnel, a blank wall with different tinted crystals jutting out at odd angles. Moving more from habit then conscious thought, I twisted in the silver one widdershins, then the green crystal deasil. I drew a snaking "S" in the blank circular area in the center. The crystals all drew into the wall, the wall drew into the ceiling.

The door opened into the Slytherin Perfect study room, on the same level as the sixth year dorms. I climbed the stairs to the common room, body still working more from habit than conscious effort. Staggering and stumbling my way out into the busy common room, I elicited stares and sneers from the younger and upperclassmen, respectively. My body was too weak and weary to stand anymore, muscles spasming and shaking. Falling to my knees, I brought my head down to touch the floor and did the only thing I could think off. I screamed.

I shrieked, hollered, yelled. Each cry of anguish and suffering echoed back at me off the dungeon walls, _anchoring_ me in the real world. The brilliant light flowed out of my brain. Darkness came in its wake and I wondered if it would hurt when I woke up before giving into the dawning dark.

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Hey look, it can stand alone. But then you only have half the mystery. Rather short too. Le sigh Well this is my third fic, ever. I doing conversations though, Grrrarrr... Please tell me if it is worth continuing. The first to review gets the chapter dedicated after them. 


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